9 ms·
300 MW is still pretty big, isn't it? Why don't they build nuclear reactors that can be made on a factory assembly line, shipped on the back of truck, and inst
by Maximus9000 3y ago
300 MW is still pretty big, isn't it? Why don't they build nuclear reactors that can be made on a factory assembly line, shipped on the back of truck, and installed right where it's needed in a town?
I assume the reactors in a nuclear sub are sort of like what I'm talking about.
- nordsieck 3y ago> Why don't they build nuclear reactors that can be made on a factory assembly line, shipped on the back of truck, and installed right where it's needed in a town? It's very difficult to get a permit.
- kwhitefoot 3y ago> Why don't they build nuclear reactors that can be made on a factory assembly line, Rolls Royce is proposing just that: https://www.rolls-royce-smr.com/why-rolls-royce-smr https://www.rolls-royce-smr.com/why-rolls-royce-smr
- rjsw 3y agoWestinghouse has made nuclear submarine reactors. The UK small modular reactor project is being run by Rolls-Royce who make the equivalent submarine reactors. Both SMR projects seem to be about 10x the power output of a submarine reactor. I'm guessing they have to use a very different level of fuel enrichment than is in subs.
- jmj42 3y agoThis is also being done. Micro-reactors are generally sub-20MWe and are intended to be portable. The biggest name is micro-reactors is probably Project PELE[1]. PELE is a DoD project to develop a trailer mounted micro-reactors for remote deployment. PELE will be tested at the Idaho National Lab[2] (DoE's primary nuclear energy research lab). Speaking of INL, they are also building the MARVEL[3] reactor. MARVEL is another test reactor of the micro-reactor type. MARVEL is being funded by DOE-NE (if I recall) and is designed to be be a 100kW. [1] https://www.cto.mil/pele_eis/ https://www.cto.mil/pele_eis/ [2] https://gain.inl.gov/GAINEPRINEI_MicroreactorProgramVirtualWorkshopPres/Day-2%20Presentations/Day-2-am.02-Nichols_PeleProgOverviewPublicMarch2020,19Aug2020.pdf https://gain.inl.gov/GAINEPRINEI_MicroreactorProgramVirtualW... [3] https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/new-marvel-project-aims-supercharge-microreactor-deployment https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/new-marvel-project-aims-s...
- moogly 3y agoAren't micro reactors meant to be like one-use batteries? That's the info I got from listening to the Omega Tau podcast about this.
- jnsaff2 3y agoOne use of 2-3 years. You have two of them working at the same time and when it’s time to refuel you have a new one waiting and old gets shipped back to factory for refueling. The expensive part of nuclear power plants is all the electricity generation part (turbines/generators/piping/transformers/etc) that is pretty much the same as for coal power plants. You don’t swap out any of that.
- moogly 3y agoWhat are the chances the old one will be left on the site because it's not financially viable to ship it back and recycle it?
- zizee 3y agoThey are the size of a shipping container, not prohibitively expensive to move. The customers buying these things have no ability to recycle/refuel or dispose of the spent fuel. I presume any purchase agreement comes with a commitment to deal with it at end of life. I guess if the supplier goes out of business, you might have trouble, but I'd expect these companies are putting things in place for that eventuality e.g. insurance.
- nine_k 3y agoThey are one-use batteries in the sense that they are sealed and not intended to be refueled at the place of deployment, if ever. They can last for a decade without refueling though, so it may be fine.
- fsh 3y agoThe economics just don't work out. Small reactors still end up being enormously expensive, but without the huge power output of large ones. There is a reason why all power plants use gigawatt-scale reactors.
- dtagames 3y agoAnd big ones require government subsidies, tax breaks, and federal insurance since they are uninsurable on their own. Externalities are critical in nuclear and it still doesn't make money for the operators.
- euroderf 3y agoIf these are modular and come on a truck, does that mean that basically Westinghouse will finance its own inventory, and that for the customer there's just a down payment until it's up and running ? This would change the structure of financing AFAIK.
- ajmurmann 3y agoIt's really unfortunate that we fail to price in negative externalities for other energy sources.
- legulere 3y agoAre the externalities for wind and solar, the fastest growing electricity sources, significant when compared to other electricity sources?
- ajmurmann 3y agoNo, but the externalities of fossil fuels, the worst energy sources, are very significant. Yet these get subsidized in many countries and Germany is even moving to coal. I'm comparison between nuclear and fossil it definitely matters.
- 3y ago
- mastax 3y agoThere are economies of scale, in the sense that (very roughly) material costs are a rounding error and scaling up the reactor doesn't make the design more complex it just makes the parts larger. The Gen III+ reactor designs all went big as a cost-efficiency measure, not that it worked out particularly well. The major caveats being that very large pressure vessels required specialized forges to be constructed and that very large concrete pours are more difficult than simply large ones. The "build the reactor in a factory" idea could still hold some merit, though there's not much reason to make it smaller once it's small enough to fit on a barge or a wide-load trailer. I'm not sure that making even smaller reactors than that to make more of them for economies of scale makes sense. It's hard to imagine that 2x 150MW reactors could ever be cheaper than 1x 300MW reactor. The economies of scale efficiency benefits tend to be very sub-linear.
- icegreentea2 3y agoYes. We could basically say that there are two different markets for small nuclear, which will probably settle at different levels. The first is just stepping back a bit from the GW scale plants to try to reap some economies of scale in terms of making the projects and processes less bespoke, even though the raw amount of material consumed might be higher. The other would be uh... I guess "niche" applications? This is where scaling down even more (sub 50MWe?) happens. This could be some DoD related stuff, or trying to power remote communities (which aren't already grid connected). I'm sure there might be a handful of interesting industrial applications (I know the Tar Sands in Canada is interested in SMRs to power their steam extraction processes).
- DarkNova6 3y agoBut the time to get your roi is likely to go down significantly. Which means overall costs could still go down and you can gradually add more capacity. But I suppose the biggest advantage is easier access to funding. Do you really want to invest 8 billion for an all or nothing project?
- EwanToo 3y agoThe Rolls-Royce SMR is pitched as exactly that, based on the submarine plants they already build. No takers yet as far as I know.
- bilsbie 3y agoCouldn’t you also suspend them over a deep concrete lined pool of water and just drop them if there are any major problems?
- throwwwaway69 3y agoSure until it boils away all the pool water and melts through the concrete and creates an ecological disaster
- zizee 3y agoMany of the newer reactor designs tout passive control mechanisms as their major selling points. We should be wary of claims of "idiot proof" designs, as we can always seem to be able to find a bigger idiot, but the risk of runaway reactions is far less with these newer designs.
- PaulHoule 3y agoAt some point the pressure vessel gets small enough that you don’t need a supersized hydraulic press to make it https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/nuclear-power-reactors/heavy-manufacturing-of-power-plants.aspx https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-c... GE’s first BWRX300 is expected to be made in Canada which is not on the list of countries with huge presses and might help with manufacturing throughput.
- cududa 3y agoAre you under the impression that nobody has had this idea before?
- briffle 3y agoNuscale is building 6x77MWe reactors in Idaho.. https://www.nuscalepower.com/en/projects https://www.nuscalepower.com/en/projects Literally like you suggested, small and able to ship on a truck, with no 'active' cooling needed. Can also take offline one of the 6 at a time for refuelling, instead of shutting down whole plant.
- Gwypaas 3y agoAt a Vogtle like cost of $120/MWh. The project is looking incredibly shaky. https://www.wired.com/story/the-dream-of-mini-nuclear-plants-hangs-in-the-balance/ https://www.wired.com/story/the-dream-of-mini-nuclear-plants...
- credit_guy 3y agoYou're saying $120/MWh like it's a bad thing. The current average price for electricity in the US is $166/MWh as of March 2023 [1]. In sunny San Diego it's $475/MWh. [1] https://www.bls.gov/regions/midwest/data/averageenergyprices_selectedareas_table.htm https://www.bls.gov/regions/midwest/data/averageenergyprices...
- pfdietz 3y agoYou're confusing the cost charged to a consumer vs. the wholesale cost of electricity. $120/MWh is completely uncompetitive as a wholesale cost. Not even the cost of storage for solar/wind would bring their cost up to that.